Breakaway

6. new friend, meet old (girl)friend.

Ryan

I lined up, aimed, and fired. The ping pong ball plopped into the red solo cup with a fizz.

"Nailed it. You are a beer pong boss!" said Smith, giving me a high five.

We'd been playing as a team and so far, we were unstoppable. Six other teams had challenged us and failed. We were singlehandedly getting the rest of the party smashed.

It was 11 o'clock and the party was full throttle. I'd been nervous about meeting so many new people, but Ethan's friends had been great so far. Well, a few of them seemed afraid to talk to me; and I think some of them may have been hitting on me. But they had all been nice enough, nonetheless.

Smith was probably my favorite because he had been friendly, without any obvious agenda, and he was hilariously sarcastic. With hipster glasses and dark, spiky hair, he was cute in a nerdy-hot kind of way. Not my type, but we would definitely be fast friends.

The doorbell rang, followed by some commotion at the front door. Axel came over to us, looking uneasy. I was surprised he'd managed to break himself free from Isabelle's lips; they'd been all over each other the entire evening.

"Smith," said Axel tersely. I could swear he had turned several shades paler. "Alexis is here."

Alexis? Who's Alexis? I was fairly sure Ethan didn't have a girlfriend. And if he did have a girlfriend, I would hope for a better reception than that.

Smith made a face and groaned, "Shit. Who invited them?"

It was clear that there was a backstory here that I was missing, and things were getting awkward, fast. I decided to leave them to discuss whatever this Alexis situation was, excusing myself to get another drink from the kitchen. Vodka soda sounded good. After two beers, I felt bloated and needed something lighter.

Ethan was standing at the counter, mixing a mystery concoction in a cup. He opened a bottle of liquor and poured it in without measuring. Tasting it, he frowned, and dumped another kind of liquor into the mix. I wondered if he knew what he was doing or if he was just drunk.

"Enjoying the party?" he asked, leaning against the kitchen counter beside me, slurping his sewer sludge.

He seemed more sober than I'd expected given whatever it was that he was drinking.

His fitted V-neck matched his denim-blue eyes; If he had been some random guy at a party, I definitely would have been tempted to flirt with him. I was still tempted to flirt with him, but I reminded myself that I could enjoy the view and that was all.

I nodded as I grabbed a plastic cup and poured in some vodka. I didn't want to get sloppy, so I went light on the liquor, heavy on the club soda, extra ice.

"Yeah, I'm having a lot of fun."

He grinned and said, "I think your friend Isabelle is, too," nodding to the corner where Iz and Axel were making out again. Or more like, were eating each other's faces. Yuck. I would have told them to get a room, but that would have probably been my room and, no thanks.

Suddenly, a sugary-sweet female voice chimed in from behind us, "Why Ethan, you didn't tell me you had a new friend."

I turned and saw a gorgeous girl with long sandy hair and tanned, glowing skin. She teetered on gold stilettos, her white denim cutoffs showcasing her mile-long legs. All in all, she was pretty intimidating—and I wasn't easily intimidated.

"I'm Alexis," she said, blatantly sizing me up from head to toe. "Ethan's girlfriend. And you are?"

It was like one of those scenes in a movie where the record screeches and everything goes silent. The whole room stopped what they were doing to stare at us.

Ethan scowled at her, cutting in, "She means ex-girlfriend. And this is Ryan, my new roommate."

Her nostrils flared as anger flickered across her pretty face for a nanosecond. It was brief, but I saw it. She definitely did not like the idea of me living with Ethan.

She said, "Nice to meet you, Ryan," but I could tell that she really meant 'fuck you'.

She batted her eyes and added with mock confusion, "Ethan hasn't really talked about you at all."

Was that supposed to be some kind of dig? I knew that I would probably regret it, but I wasn't in the mood to be shit talked to.

Ethan opened his mouth to interject. Before he could, I smiled and answered innocently, "Funny, Ethan's never mentioned you either."

Off to the side, I could see Geoff and Luca's mouths drop wide open and Smith's shoulders shaking with silent laughter. Ethan's mouth quirked at the corners, but he kept a straight face. I had a feeling that people talking back to Alexis wasn't something that happened often; I hoped I hadn't just made a very big, very bad mistake.

She glowered at me for a moment before regaining her composure. Finally, she straightened her shoulders and lifted her chin.

"I'm going to find my friends. Ethan, we have to talk later. Alone," she snapped, marching away.

An hour later, I was upstairs in my bathroom, fiddling with the tweezers and eyelash glue—again. I should never have let Iz talk me into these false eyelashes. They were a terrible idea.

The left strip of eyelashes stubbornly refused to stay put. It kept drooping into my line of sight like a dead spider. I felt more Tammy Faye than femme fatale.

Suddenly, I heard muffled voices arguing from Ethan's room next door. I knew it probably wasn't any of my business, but I wanted to know what was going on. I put my ear up against the wall to see if I could make out what they were saying.

"Ethan... unacceptable... cannot live here," a shrill female voice said.

A male voice argued back, "Not your decision, Alexis... can't be friends... jealous."

Ugh. I hoped that I hadn't caused this fight. I didn't want to cause problems for Ethan and I definitely didn't want him to be upset with me if I had.

On the one hand, Alexis kind of seemed like a crazy bitch, so maybe it wasn't entirely all my fault. On the other, my snarky retort probably hadn't helped things, either. I wasn't sure what had gotten into me. It was out of character for me to engage with someone like that.

A door slammed, followed by heavy footsteps clattering down the stairs. I paused, holding my breath and waiting for the second set of footsteps. It didn't come. Finally, I decided to slink outside and see if I could make it back downstairs unnoticed.

Ethan's room was situated between my room and the staircase. I was trying to ninja past when he opened the door to his room, catching me in the act. I froze. He looked surprised to see me standing there.

"Hey. Everything okay?" He asked, frowning.

Stay cool, I told myself. "Just, uh, freshening up." I scrambled for an explanation, landing on, "My contacts were bothering me."

Why did I just lie to him? That was a really stupid lie, too; I didn't even wear contacts, and he was bound to find that out eventually. Maybe he wasn't big on details. Or maybe I could just pretend I'd had laser eye surgery at some later date.

He furrowed his brow. "Did you hear any of that?"

"Uh, no. Well, I mean, yes. Kind of," I admitted, cringing at the awkwardness. "I didn't mean to. I'm sorry."

"No, don't be." He shook his head. "I'm sorry. You shouldn't feel uncomfortable in your own house. She's just... insane sometimes. All of the time, actually. She wasn't supposed to be here tonight. It won't happen again."

"Are you sure some of that wasn't my fault?" I asked. "You know, because of what I said to her earlier."

Ethan chuckled. "No, my problems with Alexis pre-date you significantly. Don't worry about it. And she started in on you first. I can't blame you for standing up for yourself. In fact, I admire it. Most people don't have the nerve."

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Author's Note: What did Alexis do that was so terrible? And was making an enemy of her a mistake? I don't think it's the last we have heard from her.  Thanks for reading! Don't forget to vote, comment and follow!